Agriculture Lecture 1

[An
introduction to the surroundings ...] " .... I
am quite convinced that everyone here will be perfectly satisfied with
the hospitality that has been provided.

Whether you will be equally
satisfied with the course of lectures itself is a question which is
perhaps open to dispute, although
we shall do our best during the discussions which will take place later,
to reach
accord on what has been said, For you must remember that though in
many quarters there has been an ardent desire for such a course of lectures,
it is the
first time that I have undertaken such a task from within the heart
of Anthroposphical strivings.

A course of this kind naturally makes many demands for it will show
us to what
extent the interests of Agriculture are bound up with those of the
widest circles of
human existence and that there is scarcely a single sphere of life
which has not
some relation to Agriculture. From some viewpoint or another all
the various
interests of life are contained in Agriculture, Here we shall naturally
only touch
upon the central portion of the subject itself. But this necessity
will lead us to
detours which are inevitable, because everything which is said will
have Anthroposophy itself as a basis.

I would in particular ask you
to forgive me if in
the introductory lecture to-day there is much that seems so divergent
from our
subject that many of you will not immediately see what bearing
it has upon
specifically agricultural problems. But what we shall say to-day
of things which
may seem remote will nevertheless be the basis of our work.
The cultural life of modern times has had particular and serious
effects upon
Agriculture. It has had economic consequences, the destructive
character of
which few people todawy have the slightest idea.

It was in
order to defeat
these tendencies that certain economic enterprises were attempted
within the
Anthroposophical Movement. This work was undertaken by industrialists
and
business men, but they did not achieve all the aims they had set
themselves, simply because at the present time there are too many opposing
forces to allow
of this attempt being really understood. The individual is helpless
in the midst of
these existing hostile powers, and the inner kernel and essential
aims of these
economic strivings which originated in the Anthroposophical Movement
have
therefore never really come under discussion.
What were the practical questions at issue? I will explain them
taking Agriculture
as an example in order to deal with the matter in concrete rather
than in abstract
and general terms.

There are to-day a great many books and lectures
on so-called Economics, These contain chapters on Agriculture ; the
authors try to
deal with this subject on the basis of economics. Now in connection
with agriculture this whole business, books and lectures an economics
is manifest nonsense. This nonsense is however, very wide spread to-day.
Everyone should
be able to see that Agriculture and its place in the social order
can only be
discussed when one starts from a knowledge of what is entailed
in the growing of
turnips potatoes and corn. Without this it is useless to discuss
principles of
Economics involved. These things must be unravelled on the basis
of the actual
facts they cannot be established on vague theoretical assumptions.

If you say this
to those who have listened to a number of their university colleagues
talking
about Economics in relation to Agriculture it will strike them
as completely absurd because they regard the subject as already established.
But this is not the case.
Judgment in agricultural matters must come from practical knowledge
of field and
forest and of the breeding of animals. There can be no fruitful
vision in agriculture
or in anything else so long as people do not realise that this
hovering over the
subject from the point of view of Economics is mere talk and
nothing more; one
must go back to the practical foundations in every department
of life.

You can say
of a turnip that it has such and such a colour and consists of
such and such
constituents, But that is not to understand the turnip - not
by a long way, nor,
above all does it take into account the living relationship of
the turnip to the soil,
to the season at which it ripens, and many other important matters.

Let me make this clear by an illustration taken from another sphere.
If you
observe the needle of a compass you discover that one end always
approximately points to the north, the other to the South. But you
seek the cause for this not in
the magnetic needle itself but in the earth as a whole, at one
end of which is
what is called the Magnetic North at the other end is the Magnetic
South Pole.

To
try and discover from the magnetic needle itself why it should
so obstinately turn
in one direction would be absurd. For its constant maintenance
of direction can
only be understood in relation to the whole earth. Yet what in
the case of the
magnetic needle is clearly absurd is regarded by many people
as sense when it
comes to other things.

The turnip is regarded as growing only
within the narrow
confines of its immediate earthly surroundings, but this becomes
impossible if
one comes to the point that its growth may be dependent upon
innumerable factors which are not present on earth at all but in its cosmic surroundings.
And thus in practical life many things are explained and ordered
to-day as though
we had to do only with the narrow isolated phenomenon, and not
with activities and influences coming from the whole Universe, The
various departments of
modern life have suffered very gravely through this and would
have suffered still
more had not people continued to rely on a certain instinct in
these matters in
spite of all advances of modern science.

To turn to a completely
different sphere
it has always been a source of satisfaction to me that people
who, following their
doctor's orders, weigh every morsel of the food they eat - so
many ounces a
meat, so many ounces of cabbage ( some people even have scales
on the table
beside their plates ) - it is always a source of satisfaction
to me, when the
unfortunate individual still feels hungry, so long as he has
not had enough, and
thus proves that instinct is still present in him.

In the same
way, instinct was at
the root of all the work of man in this realm before there was
a science of the
subject, and its indications were often very sure ones. The old
calenders with
their versified rules of practice that one still finds among
peasants are often
surprisingly wise and expressive. And it is quite possible for
a man with sure
instincts to avoid superstition in these matters. For along with
very profound
sayings concerning the sowing and reaping of grain we get occasional
sayings
directed against extravagances for example:

"If the cock
crows on the dunghill it
will either rain or keep fine"

(Kraht der Hakn auf dem Mist,
so regnet es oder
bleibt wie ea ist)

Instinctive wisdom is always sufficiently
armed with a sense of
humour to be on its guard against superstition.

Speaking from
the Anthroposophical point of view what we have to do is not
so much to return to
the old instincts as, through a deeper spiritual insight, to
discover things which
can be applied ever less and less by the instincts as they have
become uncertain.
This task demands that in studying the life of plants, of animals
and of the earth
itself we should extend our views to the whole cosmos.

For while
it is quite right
to reject a trivial connection between rain and the phases of
the Moon, yet on the
other hand the following has happened, I have told the story
already on other
occasions. In Leipsic there were two professors one of them Gustav
Theodor Fechner, a man gifted with keen insight in spiritual
matters, claimed that from external observations which he had
made, the existence of a connection between
periods of rain and the course of the Moon around the earth
was not a mere
superstitious belief. He had come to this view through statistical
evidence. But his
colleague, the famous Professor Schleiden denied the contention
on theoretical
grounds. These two university professors were both married
and Fechner who
had a certain sense of humour, said: "Let our wives decide
which of us is right".

Now it so happened that in those days at Leipsic, water was scarce
and had to be
fetched from a distance. So it was the custom in order to have sufficient
for
washing day, to collect rain which ran from the houses in pitchers
and barrels.

Frau Professor Schleiden did this, and so did her neighbour Frau Professor
Fechner. But there was not room for them both to set out their pitchers
and
barrels in the courtyard at the same time. So Professor Fechner said: "If
my
honoured colleague is right and the time of the month does
not matter, then Frau
Professor Schleiden can put out her pitchers at the time when
according to my
reading of the Iunar phase there will be less rain, and my
wife will put out hers
during the period when my calculations tell me there will be
more rain. If my
theory is all nonsense, Frau Professor Schleiden will no doubt
gladly fall in with
this arrangement."

But lo and behold! Frau Professor Schleiden
would do nothing
of the sort and preferred to go by Professor Fechner's statement
rather than by
that of her husband.
And so it often happens Science may be right, but practice
cannot be ruled by " the rightness" of science.

But to speak more seriously. This
example has only
been 'introduced in order to show that we must look a little
further than we are
accustomed to look nowadays when we are considering that which
alone makes it
possible for man to live on this planet - I mean Agriculture.
I cannot say whether
what I going to say out of Anthrosophy will be satisfactory
to us In every respect,
but I shall try to bring before you what Anthroposophy can
contribute to
Agriculture.

***

I will now begin to draw your attention to some facts within
our earthly existence
which have an important bearing upon Agriculture. We are
so accustomed nowadays to lay the chief stress upon the physio-chemical
constituents of any
substance. Now I propose to start from an examination not
of the physio-chemical constituents, but of something which lies behind
them and is of
very special importance to the life of the plant on the
one hand and of the animal
on the other.

Human life and to a certain extent the life
of animals as well has
become emancipated to a large extent from world workings
outside them. The
nearer we come to man, the more strongly marked is this
emancipation. In both
'human and animal life we find manifestations which seem
to be entirely independent of extra-terrestrial influences or even
of the atmospheric influences
surrounding the earth. Not only does this seem so, but
it actually is the case in
regard to many things in life.

True, we know that certain
atmospheric changes
will accentuate the pain attending certain illnesses. What
is less well known is
that certain illnesses and certain other life phenomena
imitate in their rhythms
the course of certain processes in nature, but do not coincide
with those of these
natural processes in their beginnings and endings. We need
only recall one of the
most important phenomena, female menstruation, which in its
rhythmic character
is an imitation of the monthly changes of the Moon, yet the
beginnings and
endings of the two phenomena do not coincide. There are many
more intimate manifestations - both in the male and the female
organisms, which imitate the
rhythms of Nature.

For example, a closer study of the periodicity
of sun-spots
would bring us to a better understanding of much that happens
in the social life.
But these things are not noticed, because the social phenomena
which corresponds to the periodic change of the spots on
the sun, does not begin and
end when they do, but has become emancipated from them.
The periodicity and
rhythm are the same but there is no coincidence in time.

It is easy enough to dismiss as nonsense the statement that human
life is a microcosm which imitates
the macrocosm. If for instance one refers to certain illnesses
having a period of
fever which lasts seven days it could be objected that
whenever the fever
corresponding external phenomena occurred in nature, the
fever ought to appear
and run a parallel course; but the fever does not do this!
Nevertheless it is true
that the fever retains the inner rhythm even if its beginning
and end do not
coincide with those of the external event. This emancipation
from cosmic events
is almost complete in the case of man; it is less complete
in the animal; while
plant life is to a high degree immersed in the general
Cosmic life of Nature and
also in its earthly surrounding.

For this reason we shall
never acquire any real
understanding of plant-life unless we realise that everything
on earth is only a
reflection of what takes place in the cosmos. This reflection
is hidden in the case
of man because he has emancipated himself. He carries within
him the inner
rhythm. But the connection is still there in the highest
degree in plants and it is to
this that I wish to direct your attention in this introductory
talk.

In the immediate vicinity of the earth, we have the
Moon and the other planets,
be old instinctive science which reckoned the Sun, as one
of the planets had one
of the following sequence Moon Mercury, Venus, Sun, Mars,
Jupiter, Saturn. Now
without going any further into the astronomical aspect
of the subject I wish to
point to the relation which exists between planetary life
and life on the earth.

If
we consider life on the earth in general the first thing
we have to take into
account is the very important part played by the what I
might call the life of the
silicious substance in the world. You will find this silicious
substance in the very
beautiful mineral quartz enclosed in prismatic and pyramidal
forms.

Quartz is
silicious substance combined with oxygen; remove the oxygen
mentally, and you
have the so called silicon. This silicon is regarded by
modern chemistry as one of
the elements (oxygen, etc,) and when united with oxygen
may be regarded as a
chemical substance.

But we must not forget that this silicon
which lives in the
mineral quartz makes up from 47% to 48% of the crust of
the Earth. Ie a higher
percentage than that of any other substance on earth, oxygen, for
example,
amounting only to 27% to 28%. Now silicon, in the form
in which it appears in
such stony substances as quartz, does not at first seem
to possess very much
importance if we consider only the material of the soil
of earth with its plant
growth.

Quartz is not soluble in water - the water trickles
through it. It thus
seems to have no connection with the ordinary commonplace
view of "conditions
of life". But if you take the Equisetum (horsetail)
you will find that it consists of
90% of silicon (the same substance of which quartz consists)
in very fine
distribution through its form.

This shows the enormous
importance which this
substance, silicon must have. It forms nearly one half
of everything on the earth,
And yet so completely has its importance been overlooked
that its use has been
neglected even where it can have the most beneficent results.

Silicon forms an
essential constituent of many remedies used in Anthroposophical
therapy. A
whole series of diseases are treated either internally
or by baths with this
substance, the reason being that what appears in the form
of abnormal conditions of the sense organs ( it only appears
there, it does not really lie there
) the internal sense organs, as a cause of pain is strangely
accessible to the
influence of silicon.

In general silicon plays the
greatest conceivable part in
what has been called by the old-fashioned name of the "household
of Nature". For
It is present not only in quartz and other stones, but
in a highly refined state in
the atmosphere. Indeed it is present everywhere. One half
of the earth at our
disposal consists of silicon.

What then is the function
of this substance? To answer this question let us assume
that our earth contained only half of the
quantity of silicon which it actually does possess. We
should then have plants in
more or less pyramidal form: the blooms would be atrophied
and indeed all plants
would assume generally the shape of the cacti which strikes
us as so abnormal.

The cereals would look grotesque; their stems would grow thick and fleshy
towards the base, but the ears would be emaciated and without grain,
So much for silicon. On the other hand in every part of the earth although
not in
such abundance as is silicon, we find lime and their allied substances
( limestone
Potash and Sodium). If these were present in small proportions we should
have
plants whose stems were only narrow and twisted we should have only creepers.
There would be blooms of course but the would be useless and yield nothing
of
any food value. It is only through the balance of these two formative
forces - as
embodied in these two substances, silicon and limestone - that plant
life can
flourish in the form in which we know it today.

Now everything silicious contains forces that come not from the earth
but from
the so-called distant planets- Mars Jupiter and Saturn - the planets
beyond the
Sun. These planets work indirectly upon plant-life through silicon
and allied
substances. But the planets near the Earth- Moon Mercury and Venus,
send out
forces into the plant life and animal life on earth through the medium
of the
limestone and kindred substances. Thus of any cultivated field it may
be said that
the forces of both silicon and limestone are at work in it. The silicon
mediates the
influences of Mars, Jupiter and Saturn, the limestone those of Moon,
Venus and
Mercury.

Now let us turn to the plants themselves. There are two things to notice
about all
plants. The first is that the plant world as a whole and every single
species have
the power to perpetuate their kind and develop the force of reproduction,
etc. The
second is that the plant as a member of a relatively low order of nature
serves as
nourishment for members of higher orders.

These two fundamental tendencies
seem at first to have little to do with one another. For if we only
look at the
passing on of the step from parent plant to offspring and so on, it
is a matter of
difference to the formative forces of Nature whether or not the plant
is used for
food. The two interests ( ie of mature and Man) are completely different
, and yet
the forces of Nature act in such a way that the inherent powers of
reproduction and growth and of producing generation after generation
of plants are active in
the cosmic influences exercised upon earth by the Moon, Venus and Mercury
through the mediation of limestone.

If we consider plants which are
not used for
food, which do nothing but reproduce themselves, we take no interest
in the
cosmic forces of Venus, Mercury and Moon, related to reproduction.
But in the
case of plants which are eminently suitable for food because their
substances have become perfected to the point of forming foodstuffs,
for human and animal
consumption, it is the planets Mars, Jupiter and Saturn that are
working through
the medium of silicon. Silicon opens up the being of plant to the
expanses of the
Universe, it awakens the plant's senses, so that it absorbs the formative
forces
bestowed by the distant planets, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn. From sphere
of Moon,
Venus and Mercury on the other hand, the plant absorbs only that
which makes it
capable of reproducing itself.

Now this seems at first to be just
an interesting
theory. But every insight taken from a wider horizon leads us quite
naturally from
theory to practice.
If then certain forces coming from the Moon, Venus and Mercury
enter the Earth
and become effective in plant life the question arises: What will promote
and
what will restrain the activity of these forces? For Instance in what
way can the
activities of Moon or Saturn be modified in their influence on plants?

If we
observe the course of the year, we shall find that on some days
there is rain and
on others none. All that the modern physicist observes is the
fact that on rainy
days more water falls on the Earth than on dry days! Water moreover
is to him
something abstract consisting of oxygen, hydrogen, and nothing
more. If water is

decomposed by electrolysis it is split into two substances, each of
which acts in its own way. But this tells us nothing about water , There
is much more hidden in water than appears in the chemical properties
of hydrogen and oxygen.

Water by its very nature is eminently fitted
to bear along with it the forces coming from the Moon on to the Earth,
So It comes about that it is water which distributes the lunar forces
throughout the earthly realm. There is a certain kind of relation between
the Moon and the water on the Earth. Let us suppose that after a rainy
spell there is a full moon, Now the forces coming from the Moon when it is
full causes something tremendous to happen on Earth. They shoot right
into the whole growing forces of the vegetable kingdom. They cannot
do so if there has not been a rainy spell beforehand.

We must always
realise the importance of sowing seed after rainy days followed by
the full moon and we should never work at random (true something will
always come up). The question: How to connect our seed-sowing with rain
and full Moon has definite practical importance, because the forces that
come from the Full Moon work powerfully and abundantly on certain plants
after rain but only weakly and sparingly after a spell of sunny weather.
The old adages of husbandry contained such knowledge. People recalled
the adage, and which told them what to do. These adages or saws are
looked upon nowadays as superstition and scientists are not yet sufficiently
interested to work out a real science of the matter.

Furthermore around the Earth we find the atmosphere. In addition to
consisting of air the atmosphere has the property of being sometimes
warm and sometimes cold. At times there is certainly accumulation of
heat which, if the tension becomes too great, may discharge itself in
a thunderstorm. Now what can we say about warmth? Spiritual observation
shows that while water has no relation to silicon, warmth is so powerfully
related to it that it enhances the activity of the forces working through
silicon namely , the forces coming from Saturn Jupiter and Mars.

These
forces coming from Saturn Jupiter and Mars have to be valued on quite
a different scale from that adopted in the case of Moon Venus and Mercury,
for it must be remembered that Saturn takes thirty years to go round
the Sun, while the Moon takes only about twenty-eight days to pass
through all its phases. Thus Saturn only visible for fifteen years, consequently
stands in quite another relation to the growth of plants compared
with the Moon. As a matter of fact Saturn is not only active when it
is shining down on the Earth, it is also active when its rays have
to pass from below, as it were, through the Earth.

Now as Saturn takes
thirty years to revolve around the Sun we find that at certain
times It shines directly on one spot on the Earth and that it can work
upon this spot by going right through the Earth , (See diagram No 1)
The strength with which the Saturn forces influence plant life on Earth
always depends upon the warmth-condition of the air. If the air is
cold they cannot reach the plants, if the air is warm they can.

How then
can we see their influence at work in the plant? We see it not in the
annuals but in the perennials; not in those plants which grow up and
die in the course of one year leaving only their seed behind them but
in those which are perennial. It is the latter whose growth Saturn
promotes with the help of the warmth forces of the Earth. The effect
of these forces working through the mediation of warmth, is to be seen,
for instance in the bark or cortex of trees and in everything that
makes the plant a perennial. When the lives of plants are limited to
the short span of a single year, it is because of the relation in which
those plants stand to the planets with short periods of revolution.
On the other hand, that which emancipates itself from the fleeting
process and is made permanent in the formation of bark around the
growing trees is connected with the planetary forces working through
the mediation of warmth and cold, and the periods of revolution in these
cases are long. Thirty years in the case of Saturn, twelve in the case
of Jupiter.

Again it is well for anyone who wants to plant an oak tree
to know something of the periodicity of Mars, for an oak tree planted
during the appropriate period of Mars will thrive much better than
one planted unthinkingly, at any moment that happens to be convenient.

Or, if you have a plantation of conifera, where the Saturn forces play
so great apart, it will make all the difference if the trees are planted
when Saturn is in the so-called ascending period or at another
time. Anyone who has insight into these matters can tell quite accurately
in the case of plants that are doing well or badly whether or not they
have been tended with a right understanding of their relation to planetary
forces., For what is not always obvious to the external
eye is revealed to more intimate observation.

To take for example; If
we burn wood taken from a tree which has been planted without an understanding
of the cosmic rhythms we do not get such a healthy heat as from
wood taken from a tree which has been planted with right understanding.
It is precisely on the little matters of everyday life that these
things play so great a part and that the importance of such differences
are revealed. But people live their lives almost unthinkingly.
They do not take the trouble to consider such details and everything
goes on like a machine. If you pull
the right trigger, the machine works, and the materialistically-
minded imagine
that the whole of Nature works on the same principle.

And yet
regarding nature
so and working upon upon her in this way brings us
face to face with certain
stupendous results in practice. Why, for instance is
it impossible to-day to obtain
such fine potatoes as I remember eating in my youth?
It is impossible to find
such potatoes even in the districts in which they used
to be grown. (It is really so
I have tested them everywhere) The nutritive forces
of certain foods have
actually declined over a passage of time. The last
decade shows this quite
distinctly.

The reason is we no longer understand the
intimate forces at work in
the whole cosmos. These must be sought for once again,
and sought for along
such lines as I have indicated to-day by way of introduction.
I have merely
touched upon certain questions which extend far beyond
the horizon of
contemporary vision. We shall not only continue this
consideration, but shall
search more deeply for a means of applying it to
practical life.